Well, this has been Another 30 Days of Twilight. I hope you enjoyed it.

After trying to get through a full month of craziness, I think I'm coming to some conclusions. The first is that I can't ever get things out as fast as I'd like. The second is that trying keep up the pace for a full month simply doesn't work. I lose steam in the middle, or I pick up complicated ideas that need too much time, and I simply can't get through something like an update a day. And that's without even considering the fact that some day things go wrong.

So next year, I'm probably going to change up the format a bit. First, I think I'm going to restrict the events to a single week. Knowing that, I'll have to plan ahead and I think I can pull off 7 reasonably good updates, one after the other.

Second, I'm going to start *before* the anniversary. I'll let the events lead up to Halloween, and then I'll throw the big Halloween bash to cap off the celebration. That also leaves me free to participate in NaNoWriMo, which I've been very sad to miss for four years running, specifically due to Twilight Heroes. To be honest, I haven't really had a creative outlet other than this game since I started. 11 months out of the year I can live with that, but next year I want to be able to try a little something different now and then.

But don't worry, I'll make sure you've got plenty of things to keep you occupied by then. I am bound and determined to have retcon (ascension) done by then, so replayability ought to be able to keep people going. That means a guarantee of at least one more quest in the next year (level 11 ties in with the retcon plot, and lets you have that showdown with the Mick you've all been waiting for.

Before retcon I also know I need to add a hints system, to smooth out some rough edges, for when replayability brings in swarms of players new and old alike. I've also got a swarm of recipes to include from the welding contest (good stuff, folks, really). I'm hoping both leagues and personal stores will get over their hurdles and make it into the mix, but I may not hold up retcon for them -- neither will enhance retcon much, and they can go in later. (I'm still hopeful, though.)

Beyond that, I've got two major other points to think about. One is villains--not the wandering type, but classes for players. I'm about 90% sure that won't happen at this stage, but it's the sort of thing that would make retcon richer if I could pull it off.

The other, which is a definite addition, is skill points. Look for more on that in coming days. I don't usually subject things to public discussion before release, but I think this one might benefit from having a lot of contributing voices. Even if most of them are just saying "all the other classes get the cool stuff and my class needs more." I'm also considering more transparency for skills, as points are going to turn them into much more complicated sets of equations, and I'm not sure even Muhandes and Jesus will want to try to spade them out at that point.

Anyway, that's all I've got for now. Hope everyone enjoyed the anniversary and all the events in November.